Topical Studies
What the Bible says about
Josephus
(From Forerunner Commentary)
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Genesis 22:5
The word lad means "a boy, a young man." How old was Isaac at this time? The Hebrew word translated "young men," although plural, is the same as the word for "lad." The Jewish historian Josephus gives his age as 25, while rabbinic tradition says he was 36. Other commentators suggest he was 33. Because Isaac's life parallels the life of Christ to such an extent, that he was 33 years old at this time feels right. Abraham tells his servants, "We will come back to you." Was he lying to them so as not to let Isaac know what was happening? It seems unlikely. Abraham is known as the "father of the faithful," and he had had the time to think the whole situation over. He knew that for God to deliver on His promises, Isaac would have to live. Hebrews 11:19 says Abraham acted as he did, "accounting that God was able to raise him [Isaac] up, even from the dead." He knew with ironclad certainty that God would resurrect his son. This in no way diminishes what Abraham had to do, for he still had to kill his own son! How many of us have that kind of faith?
Mike Ford
Abraham's One God
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1 Kings 6:7
Josephus adds: Now the whole structure of the temple was made, with great skill, of polished stones, and those laid together so very harmoniously and smoothly, that there appeared to the spectators no sign of any hammer, or other instrument of architecture, but as if, without any use of them, the entire materials had naturally united themselves together, that the agreement of one part with another seemed rather to have been natural than to have arisen from the force of tools upon them. (ibid.) What a beautiful picture! This is what will happen when God completes His Temple! Living stones will come from all around the world, from different "quarries." God needs gems, stones, and boulders of different shapes, sizes, materials, and colors to finish His beautiful House. Thus, God is calling people from all personality types, backgrounds, races, and strengths so each can be the precise stone He needs in a specific place in His Temple. There will be many needs, tasks, jobs, and projects in God's Kingdom. He knows exactly what "stone" He wants and where He needs it. We are those stones, planned for a specific spot for which God is preparing us. Because of His grace, blessings, and gifts, we will be fulfilling a precise role in His holy Temple. The quarry is wherever we are now, where God is cutting, shaping, and polishing us to fit into the masterpiece He is building. We lose sight of this sometimes because we do not see the whole Temple coming together. How could we? We are still in the quarry where all we can see are a few other stones perhaps similar to ourselves. We cannot see the stones from the other quarries: first-century Christians, patriarchs, prophets, kings, true Christians throughout history, or even all the believers alive today. We do not see the whole picture yet—and will not—until all the stones arrive at the Temple Mount.
Staff
Living Stones in God's House
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2 Chronicles 26:19-21
Josephus relates an interesting story, although there is no telling how true it is. He writes that the earthquake mentioned by Amos in Amos 1:1 (where the prophet writes that he prophesied two years before the earthquake), occurred when Uzziah entered the sanctuary. Further, he says that the roof of the sanctuary was torn or rent by the quake, and a ray of sunlight drilled into the Temple, striking Uzziah in the forehead. The shaft of light was quickly obscured, but the leprosy remained. Tradition says that this was the hand of God, showing His displeasure at the presumptuous pride of this man, whom He had blessed so greatly and who now felt infallible, above doing wrong, and that his word had become law. Again, we see a man who started out marvelously, but when confronted late in life with the truth and told to repent for turning away—God was trying to save him from his destructive course—Uzziah refused.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Why Three Kings Are Missing From Matthew 1
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Matthew 26:17-19
Matthew, Mark, and Luke each contain language that appears to put Jesus and the disciples' Passover preparations and observance on the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. It is helpful to understand the religious environment of the first century and what led up to it. In so doing, we will have taken a long step toward answering this seeming contradiction. First, the original instructions clearly stipulate that Passover is a single day—Abib 14—followed by the seven-day Feast of Unleavened Bread, beginning on Abib 15 (Exodus 12:6-20; Leviticus 23:5-8; Numbers 9:2-5). These instructions also direct the Israelites to keep the Passover in individual homes rather than at the Tabernacle or Temple (Exodus 12:22). Over time, though, the children of Israel moved farther from God and His instructions. During the reigns of the kings, Israel and Judah, now separate nations, adopted many practices from the pagan cultures surrounding them, with the kings often leading the way. However, a few kings of Judah, such as Hezekiah and Josiah, stand out for their dedication to God. Under these zealous monarchs, various religious reforms were instituted to try to bring Judah back to God's way. Among other reforms, they reinstated the commanded observance of the Passover, which the people were not keeping to any significant degree, if at all. However, these well-meaning reforms also contained a subtle change: Under both Hezekiah and Josiah—at the king's command rather than God's—the people observed the Passover at the Temple rather than in individual homes (II Chronicles 30 and 35). The kings may have done this to ensure that the people actually kept the Passover and did so without mixing in the Baalism that was so prevalent in the land. These kings' examples introduced a second way of observing the Passover. Now the Jews had both God's original Passover instructions as well as the kings' reforms to draw on when determining how to observe the festival. While God intended the Passover and Feast of Unleavened Bread to be separate (though adjacent) observances, the Jews combined the two during the Babylonian exile, as the Encyclopaedia Judaica confirms: "The feast of Passover consists of two parts: The Passover ceremony and the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Originally, both parts existed separately; but at the beginning of the [Babylonian] exile they were combined" (vol. 13, p. 169). This careless and unscriptural merging of festivals resulted in the Jews observing Passover late on Abib 14, just hours before the Feast of Unleavened Bread began. Thus, a third variation of Passover observance was added to the mix. At the time of Jesus Christ, this mixture was on full display. Philo of Alexandria, in De Vita Mosis, notes that in the early first century, the Passover was not strictly a Temple-kept event, but one in which people also killed their own lambs without help from the priests. In his Wars of the Jews, Flavius Josephus records that in 4 BC over 250,000 lambs were sacrificed for Passover. However, given the limited space of the Temple environs and the fact that Jewish tradition (not the Word of God) held that the lambs were to be slain within a two-hour time slot (from the ninth to the eleventh hour, or 3:00-5:00 pm), it is readily apparent that not all of those lambs could have been sacrificed at the Temple. In fact, Joachim Jeremias, in Jerusalem in the Times of Jesus, calculates that the three courses of priests on duty could slay only 18,000 lambs during those two hours. Josephus records that the rest of the lambs—a far greater number—were slain by individuals at their own homes. Another critical point is that, despite Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread being distinct festivals, they were commonly grouped together and simply called "Passover." Thus, when the gospel writers mention "Passover," it can sometimes refer to the Passover sacrifice itself (Matthew 26:17; Mark 14:12), the day when the sacrifice was made (Mark 14:1), or the whole eight-day period of Abib 14-21 (Passover plus Unleavened Bread; Luke 22:1). In actuality, then, there were really two Passover observances happening at the time of Jesus: one led by the priests at the Temple and the other observed by the people in their homes. These separate observances were also at different times: The Temple-kept Passover was observed late in the afternoon of Abib 14, while the home-kept Passover was kept at the beginning of Abib 14. As the gospels show, Jesus and His disciples ate the Passover in a home rather than at the Temple, observing it the evening before the priests did at the Temple. In other words, Jesus kept it as Abib 14 began, while the priests kept it as Abib 14 ended.
David C. Grabbe
Is Passover on the First Day of Unleavened Bread? (Part One)
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Hebrews 11:24-26
The importance of Pharaoh's daughter comes to the fore because Egyptian royal succession went, not through the male line, but through the female line. This historical oddity derives from Egyptian mythology, in which Isis, the sister of Osiris, marries her brother, and from them descends the royal line. The Pharaohs continued this incestuous practice of the crown prince marrying the Pharaoh's firstborn daughter, and the prince's claim to legitimacy as the future Pharaoh, hinged on his marriage to her. Their son, in turn, would be the new crown prince, also known as "the son of Pharaoh's daughter." This makes God's manipulation of events when Pharaoh's daughter found Moses in the Nile very significant. He guided Moses' ark of bulrushes directly to the Egyptian kingmaker! As Pharaoh's daughter, it was in her power to name Moses as the next Pharaoh, because he was her son by adoption. She could say, "He was born of the Nile. He was a gift from the gods," and seal his legitimacy via his miraculous appearance to her. Thus, Moses was in the position to rule all of Egypt. This makes his sacrifice of Hebrews 11:24, "refus[ing] to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter," all the more remarkable. As Egypt was the most powerful nation on earth at the time, he gave up the world's premier position of authority to lead God's people—a nation of a few million slaves—to the Promised Land. What do we know about Pharaoh's daughter? It is evident that she was a woman of great spunk, defying her father's—the Pharaoh's—command to kill all Hebrew male babies. Does Egyptian history have a crown princess like this? Yes, indeed. In fact, she had so much initiative, intelligence, cunning, and political acumen, that she became Pharaoh herself! Her name was Hatshepsut, and she is known as Egypt's greatest queen or female Pharaoh. She was the firstborn daughter of Thutmose I and married her brother, Thutmose II, who did not live very long. However, he lived long enough to sire a crown prince, Thutmose III, by a concubine. Since Thutmose II died while Thutmose III was a young child, Hatshepsut was proclaimed regent until he should come of age. She, however, had other ideas. She did not surrender the throne for about twenty years, proclaiming herself Pharaoh in the meantime. Hatshepsut's reign is known for its internal peace and increase in trade. Egypt made advancements in art, architecture, and the natural sciences while she ruled. She personally conducted wars in Nubia and Syria, even leading her troops into battle on at least one occasion. She also enjoyed the support of the religious powers of her time. Some historians say that her manner of governance is unrivaled in Egyptian history. If she (or someone very like her, as there are chronological difficulties) was the Pharaoh's daughter who raised Moses, Acts 7:22 now becomes clearer: "And Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and deeds." Now we know how this could happen. Moses, as the son of a formidable Egyptian princess, had all the learning of Egypt at his disposal, and the wisdom of Egypt was unrivaled anciently (I Kings 4:30). In his first forty years, Moses accomplished a great deal. The Jewish historian Josephus says that as its general, he led Egypt's army into Ethiopia, where he took an Ethiopian wife to secure peace with the Ethiopians rather than put them to the edge of the sword. As a prince, he received the best education available in governmental administration, arms, trade, religion, science, music, art, literature, architecture, and many other fields. In this way, God used the royal house of Egypt to prepare His chosen servant for the massive operation of leading stiff-necked Israel for forty years through the wilderness.
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Moses, Prince of Egypt
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